Transmogrified Tiger

Just for a quick comparison, there are 35 catchers with 300+ innings so far this year. Contreras would be 22nd in WP+PB/Inning and 23rd for only WP/Inning.

For the record, I'm ambivalent on abolishing the draft. I think abolishing it has some appealing positives, but I also recognize that the odds that route ends up favoring big market teams is pretty high. I'm just not sure how much it favors them. For the rest of those concerns, to me that gets lumped in to the devil is in the details. Yes, they'd absolutely need to raise the luxury tax if they went that way and have some type of floor as well as some potentially bigger penalties. I think IFA has shown that the right penalties can influence behavior and the wrong ones will be entirely ignored, so what that is is important. I'll borrow from my list of ideas here to give a slightly more complete thought: In hindsight, you can probably add 'or eligible for national TV money' to that threat of penalties for missing the floor, or you can just say that they're penalized 10 or 100x the shortage, whatever influences the behavior is the important thing.

Concacaf announced the new qualifying format for the 2022 World Cup: https://www.concacaf.com/en/world-cup-qualifying-men/article/concacaf-announces-format-for-the-2022-fifa-world-cup-confederation-qualifiers As far as I understand it, this is the short version: - The Top 6 teams by FIFA ranking in June 2020 play a round robin like the old Hex in late 2020/early 2021, the Top 3 teams automatically qualify for the World Cup - Simultaneously, rest of Concacaf is broken into groups of 4(one group of 5) and play a round robin with their group. The winner of each group makes a knockout tournament, and the winner of that knockout round plays the 4th place team for the right to make the playoff with Oceania for the remaining World Cup spot(last go round Honduras lost to Australia). This is mildly good news for teams that aren't in jeopardy of falling off the Top 6 in FIFA rankings, like the US, Mexico, and Costa Rica. They weren't at much risk for not making the hex anyway, but now they don't even need to bother with the minnows. This is bad news for teams around that border: Honduras, El Salvador, Panama, Canada, Curacao. Right now the latter 3 would both get relegated to that minnows tournament as their only shot, but the gap between them and the line isn't very big, especially since the current FIFA rankings don't include the gold cup, where Panama, Curacao, and Canada advanced and both Honduras and El Salvador failed to do so. As a result, this means the Nations League games this fall and next spring that involve those teams should be really, really important.

No it wouldn't. The biggest spenders aren't going to be able to horde everybody any more than they already can. A team's operating budget will still be a budget. If a Baltimore only wants to spend $60m on the major league roster they will have all the money in the world to sign any prospect they want. Hard capping it solves nothing. Get more money into the hands of younger players earlier in the process. Yes, set the luxury tax inclusive of draft/IFA spending and get rid of the pools, and that problem solves itself. If someone would rather give the next Kris Bryant(or Mark Appel) a 15 million bonus instead of the current Tyler Chatwood a 15 million AAV in free agency, that's fine with me. It also opens up more opportunities for teams to be smarter about their scouting and be more creative with where they try to find value at the amateur level. Maybe a team wants to experiment with paying through the nose for 5 guys who are top 20 talents and then doing no other draft spending of note, or maybe someone wants to give 1 million to 20 different guys. You can't do that in the pool system.

I didn't include supplemental firsts because 1) their success rate is quite different than the rest of rounds 2-10; 2) they aren't consistent picks, the Cubs have had 4 supplemental firsts in the draft pool era(2 in 2012, one each in 2017 and 2019), the Cardinals have had TEN, thanks to their competitive balance comp nonsense.

To continue with the draft pool era comps: Cardinals draftees in Rds 2-10 with 2+ bWAR 2016: none 2015: Bader & DeJong 2014: none 2013: none 2012: none And the Astros: 2016: none 2015: none 2014: Mengden 2013: none 2012: Brett Phillips Granted, the Cubs are 0 fer in that window(Godley is just short of 2 bWAR), but I'm not sure 2 for 45 is materially different than 0 for 45 when those picks don't have much of a success rate to begin with.

For a point of comparison, 2012 was the first draft with bonus pools. Here's the breakdown of players who reached 2+ career bWAR: 1st round: 14 players (1 Cub, Almora) Supplemental round (also 30 picks): 10 players (no Cubs, Johnson and Blackburn picked) All other rounds combined: 23 players (1 Cub, Bote) Total: 47 players, 2 Cubs Based on the success rate of the whole group and a bump for the Cubs drafting high in the first round, you'd expect the Cubs to have had about 2 such players, and that's what they got. Your point is valid, but they got super lucky on Bote. Great late round pick, but you don't expect that kind of success from a late round pick. This is exactly the point, it's more or less a dice roll. Bote was far from being alone in that regard, that draft also had college draftees in rounds 15+ like Leone, Strahm, Oberg, Suter, and Matt Duffy meet the 2 WAR criteria. That doesn't mean those teams are especially shrewd, but it emphasizes how much failure and randomness there is once you get beyond the top 25-50 picks.

For a point of comparison, 2012 was the first draft with bonus pools. Here's the breakdown of players who reached 2+ career bWAR: 1st round: 14 players (1 Cub, Almora) Supplemental round (also 30 picks): 10 players (no Cubs, Johnson and Blackburn picked) All other rounds combined: 23 players (1 Cub, Bote) Total: 47 players, 2 Cubs Based on the success rate of the whole group and a bump for the Cubs drafting high in the first round, you'd expect the Cubs to have had about 2 such players, and that's what they got.

They have had a basically unprecedented hit rate(which absolutely includes Schwarber, Happ, and Almora) with first round picks, if you're expecting better you're expecting fantasy. Draft picks fail, as a rule. Even those at the very top of the draft. To draft 4 consecutive major leaguers who have had some level of sustained success there is incredible. Those 4 drafts also turned out Bote, Godley, and Cease. Especially in a world with draft pools, you aren't going to see aggregate results any better, it's a matter now of seeing if their last few drafts will pan out to lower ceiling/more depth once they lost a bunch of pool money/1st round position in 2016+. I'm not complaining about the performance of this Cubs FO, in terms, of hitting on 1st round draft picks even with Almora and Happ being somewhat disappointing. They've done a phenomenal job drafting at the top from '12-15. I wanted Carlos Correa in '12 and probably would've taken Almora too (I liked Giolito a lot even though he needed TJS), KB all the way in '13, I probably would've taken Conforto but I could be convinced to go with Schwarber (especially with the savings in pool money) in '14, wanted Benintendi really badly in '15 and would've taken Happ easily... I complain about McLeod and how they've performed in the later rounds (supplemental 1st and later) and especially in 2017. They're not great at identifying/developing pitchers and they've admitted as much. Hopefully, the new Pitch Lab and willingness to draft pitchers that don't fit the classic prototype will help improve that rate. The Hannemann pick was a bad choice, in retrospect. I remember thinking it was weird, but at least it's underslot because he's so old and kinda raw. That did not happen. They keep banking on these relatively raw athletic players in the draft, but I think they're doing a better job with Brennen Davis. I wasn't high on the pick (I hated it actually), but they rebuilt his swing and he's added good muscle and strength. Apparently, has a great work ethic and takes instruction really well. He still might flameout in the high minors, but he looks good so far. With the bonus pool arrangement, you can't simply compartmentalize the first round as its own thing, there's a relationship between the first 10 rounds and any other overslots that impacts the amount of ceiling you can add, especially once they started drafting at the end of the rounds instead of the beginning. With the 2017 draft it's still entirely too early to tell how well their plan for that fell out, with few exceptions(RIP Austin Filiere's career). If anything, it's the inverse of the above complaint where the top picks don't look super promising for now, but there's interesting depth that didn't come to fruition in previous classes. Which is what you'd expect from a team with the smallest draft pool that has picks 27 and 30.

Not to be pedantic, but is there a big difference between 2B and CF? Below Nico you have Ademan and Strumpf at 2B, and also Roederer and Davis. Above him you have Almora and Russell both looking like zeroes, and I guess Bote(although I'm not sure he's an every day 2B), and Happ can be mediocre defensively at both. But for 2020 and beyond they look similar to me, unless I missed someone. Davis and Roederer are far enough away and have questions about CF long term, Almora is really the only other guy there in the system, and I guess Happ no? For 2B there’s Bote, Russell, Happ, Ademan, Strumpf, and that’s not including Robel who maybe is a thing and also just my thinking it’s easier to find 2B at any level than CF (especially a potential guy who is solid to plus out there in a lot of aspects of his game). I think at this point I don't see a difference below him(admittedly Ademan and Strumpf are more polished but neither is on a fast enough track to influence where Nico breaks in/plays for at least a couple seasons), and I have to think Russell is basically done. If you think Bote is a near-everyday 2B I can get on board with that logic, but I guess the now-pedantic point I was driving at was the difference between thinking that and thinking Almora is a tweak away from being a similar caliber roadblock in CF isn't super different.

They have had a basically unprecedented hit rate(which absolutely includes Schwarber, Happ, and Almora) with first round picks, if you're expecting better you're expecting fantasy. Draft picks fail, as a rule. Even those at the very top of the draft. To draft 4 consecutive major leaguers who have had some level of sustained success there is incredible. Those 4 drafts also turned out Bote, Godley, and Cease. Especially in a world with draft pools, you aren't going to see aggregate results any better, it's a matter now of seeing if their last few drafts will pan out to lower ceiling/more depth once they lost a bunch of pool money/1st round position in 2016+.

That's really aggressive, but I love it. Him being able to play CF is probably the most valuable position for him, for this team now and in the future. OF/CF is a big weakness in the org, MIF (especially 2B) is a relative strength. So hopefully they stick with him in CF and he shows he can handle it. Not to be pedantic, but is there a big difference between 2B and CF? Below Nico you have Ademan and Strumpf at 2B, and also Roederer and Davis. Above him you have Almora and Russell both looking like zeroes, and I guess Bote(although I'm not sure he's an every day 2B), and Happ can be mediocre defensively at both. But for 2020 and beyond they look similar to me, unless I missed someone.

That was a frustrating game to lose, but on the whole I'm encouraged by the state of the USMNT this summer. I think a lot of folks haven't internalized how significant the lost generation in the player pool is. For example, if you think back to the starting 11 to start the 2014 World Cup, and compare it to whatever your current best 11 for the USMNT is, I think a fair assessment is that the current version comes out on top in 3, maybe 4 positions. That's a big drop, and some of the best players that could make up that 11 couldn't play in the Gold Cup either. To have this group show improvement, Berhalter to establish a consistent, if imperfect, style of play, and outscore teams 15-2 and only lose 1-0 to Mexico in a hostile environment is a job well done. Just need the young guys to get minutes and stay healthy, and by the time the games matter more things should be rounding into form. Sargent, Weah, McKennie, Adams, Pomykal, Cannon, Gloster, all of them could reasonably be first choice starters by 2022, and for various reasons only 2 of them played in the Gold Cup. We also shouldn't expect *all* of them to hit, but then again there's also Ledezma, Mendez, Llanez, Dest, Konrad, Yueill, Reyna, etc. and there's no shame in having a dogfight between Arriola/Morris/Boyd or Lima/Ream/Lovitz for a single spot either.

It’s hard to know when to actually start taking baseball stats seriously and everyone is going to have a different opinion, but it’s definitely not any time before 1903, which is when fouls began counting as strikes. In this vein, everyone should read Crazy '08. There's great stories like how the outfield in Pittsburgh flooded one day, and instead of canceling the game they just said anything hit to the outfield was a ground rule double. Plus, happy ending with the Cubs winning the title.

our stout adult son is just the best, isn't he

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I mean, Irvin absolutely was not going to catch that

I don't have it summed, but you can eyeball it here, 15ish%: https://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=0&type=2&season=2019&month=0&season1=2019&ind=0&team=0,ts&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&startdate=2019-01-01&enddate=2019-12-31 In 2015 it was about 11%

so proud of my stout adult son

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I don't want to be overly dramatic but I don't think it's too much to ask to put Acuna and Albies in jail for never making an out against the Cubs

how dare you disrespect James Norwood

I'm not one of the weirdos who shrieks every time a USMNT player decides to go to MLS, but this seems like a weird choice since this appears to be basically the prime moment of his career to make a decisive move, and Miami isn't going to play for 9 months. Would any team take him on loan until the winter, or are they gonna sign him and delay gratification til next summer with a full year loan? Or worst of all, loan him to USL like Adi?

As a thought exercise, how many good managers were good pitching coaches before that? I'm struggling to think of even one.